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Stop the proposal on mass surveillance of the EU

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Re: Stop the proposal on mass surveillance of the EU

#421

Post by danenania »

mjburgess wrote: post #416
danenania wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think your reading lines up with history. Putin was clearly content to allow Ukraine a large degree of sovereignty and autonomy as long as they remained under an authoritarian system. If nationalism was the only driver, why overthrow Yanukovych, thereby spitting in Putin's face and risking domination by another country? What wasn't tolerable to Putin was a bourgeoning democracy on Russia's doorstep with simil…

The "authoritarian system" in question was russia's ethnic-imperial system of empire. That it was "authoritarian" is far less important than its being Russian, ethnically and culturally. The offense to russia was first to turn to the west, and hence as Russia sees it, a counter-empire; and the secondly, the suprise and outrage, to believe that it's a Nation. Both are incomprehensible to Russia -- it has nothing to do…

I see some truth to your point, but it's also very reductive, and you're providing nothing to back up your reductionism.

The "turn to the west" is geopolitical but it's also a turn away from a conservative authoritarian order and toward a liberal democratic order. Is that just a meaningless geopolitical coincidence? No, it's clearly part of the equation, though certainly not the only part.

Re: Stop the proposal on mass surveillance of the EU

#422

Post by Eduard »

alphazard wrote: post #76

For all of the software engineers here, you would have a much larger impact by tackling this problem at a technical level, or contributing financially to groups that lobby against this sort of thing. Going out and protesting, or even helping to circulate a petition is going to be less impactful, and an inefficient use of your time and skillset. Your vote is worth 1, maybe your influence is worth a dozen or so. You co…

Better fix the root cause, not the symptoms.

Re: Stop the proposal on mass surveillance of the EU

#423

Post by canadaduane »

benevol wrote: post #332
throwrqX wrote: post #133

Every time this comes up people talk about protecting privacy and anonymity and what not and while luckily for us most of the time the laws die out they still do pass on occasion. The fundamental issue to me is that society still wants to protect against pedophiles or drug dealers or whatever other group more than protect privacy. As an example, how many people here could go on television onto some talk program or ne…

By that logic, we'd need to make knives illegal, because people get stabbed to death every day somewhere.

It isn't logic, and I think that's the point--it's an appeal to emotion, and if you pit logic vs emotion, emotion will almost always win in the broader culture. (A few oddball cultures like ycombinator and lesswrong etc. aside, perhaps).

Re: Stop the proposal on mass surveillance of the EU

#425

Post by lol768 »

DaiPlusPlus wrote: post #265
kragen wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

a compromised root ca allows an attacker who already has dns or ip control (via bgp, arp spoofing, a captive portal, etc.) to leverage it into a working mitm attack on a tls site, but it can't revoke certs it didn't sign, and the attack is over as soon as the attacker loses dns or ip control by contrast, the ca you chose to sign your cert can revoke it, or refuse to renew it, taking your website permanently offline w…

> a compromised root ca allows an attacker who already has dns or ip control DNS or host/IP control is not a requirement at all: a Trusted CA is already trusted to sign a certificate for any hostname (with exceptions): that's what Trust means, and it also means that we trust them not to issue certificates for domains/hostnames without doing at-least Domain Validation - and we have schemes like Certificate Transparenc…

If the browser enforced that the certificate had been issued in line with the domain's CAA record, such an attack might be less tractable without DNS control...

Re: Stop the proposal on mass surveillance of the EU

#426

Post by yreg »

malermeister wrote: post #296
yreg wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mass non-compliance is problematic strategy, because then the government can persecute arbitrary people for stuff that “everyone” does. GDPR is one such high stake example where no business can really feel safe.

But GDPR is kind of the opposite in that it protects the right to privacy (in this case from surveillance capitalism), so conflating them seems counterproductive

In a way both are about taking away liberties and chosing what's best for us. But yes, GDPR is not evil, it's just difficult to confidently comply with since it's so broad. Obviously very different to the proposal in the original post.

Re: Stop the proposal on mass surveillance of the EU

#427

Post by canadaduane »

throwrqX wrote: post #133

Every time this comes up people talk about protecting privacy and anonymity and what not and while luckily for us most of the time the laws die out they still do pass on occasion. The fundamental issue to me is that society still wants to protect against pedophiles or drug dealers or whatever other group more than protect privacy. As an example, how many people here could go on television onto some talk program or ne…

This is an awesome point, and one I think geeks need to hear often: We act based on our emotions even if they are well-hidden beneath logical explanations.

Perhaps the "answer" to the lady who was abused as a child is to tell another emotional story--for example, Ann Frank:

> Have you heard the story of Anne Frank? She was a Jewish girl who lived in Amsterdam during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands in World War II. She and her sister lived in hiding for two years until they were eventually discovered and arrested by the Gestapo. They later died of typhus in a concentration camp.

> How did surveillance play a role? No one knows who betrayed her. She lived through constant fear of being caught. Knowing they were being watched added to the already difficult conditions of living in hiding--the stress of the situation affected their relationships and mental health.

> If you or those you care about ever find yourself on the "less desirable" list in society, it's vital that you have some control over things you say to others in confidence. The Nazi's oppression of the Jewish people limited their freedom and contributed to Anne's tragic end.

Re: Stop the proposal on mass surveillance of the EU

#428

Post by mjburgess »

danenania wrote: post #421
mjburgess wrote: post #416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "authoritarian system" in question was russia's ethnic-imperial system of empire. That it was "authoritarian" is far less important than its being Russian, ethnically and culturally. The offense to russia was first to turn to the west, and hence as Russia sees it, a counter-empire; and the secondly, the suprise and outrage, to believe that it's a Nation. Both are incomprehensible to Russia -- it has nothing to do…

I see some truth to your point, but it's also very reductive, and you're providing nothing to back up your reductionism. The "turn to the west" is geopolitical but it's also a turn away from a conservative authoritarian order and toward a liberal democratic order. Is that just a meaningless geopolitical coincidence? No, it's clearly part of the equation, though certainly not the only part.

Well my point is only that a person reading my comments comes to see their "intuitive nationalism" as an explicit feature of their thinking, rather than a natural fact of the world.

My analysis doesnt need to be 100% to show that even the very idea of "invasion" in the modern sense is full of contingencies we don't acknowledge.

What a weird thing, no, in the history of the world that the US invades iraq and wishes for it to govern "itself".

Once you remove the "Nation" from your thinking, various issues become clearer, esp. why so many "countries" appear unstable. Ie., politically they are countries, but havent yet "progressed" to "default nationalism".

Once a region adopts nationalism, it seems there's no going back; and people of that Nation are fundamentally radicalised by that notion. There are "borders", "immigration" and indeed -- how strangely -- "illegal" immigration; there are armies, and you should join one if you're "invaded".

These ideas appear in our thinking as transparent, obvious, facts of the world; and if we feel they are violated, then we feel outraged -- and would act very severely to get redress. This is radicalism, and a certain "liberal nationalism" has deeply radicalised the west.

I think, foremost, we want Ukraine to fight Russia because we believe Ukraine to be a Nation. I think something many of its own people did not think 20 years ago, and now, many die because they believe it.

Re: Stop the proposal on mass surveillance of the EU

#429

Post by pessimizer »

O__________O wrote: post #270
pessimizer wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it’s obvious vast percentage of citizens within democracies wish they lived in an authoritarian country, yet choose to live in a democracy Most people don't get to choose where they live. It's really a relatively tiny percentage of the population who would have the financial ability and/or skills to emigrate, and those are really the people you're talking about. They have no loyalty to where they live because they…

Understand your point, though disagree. My understanding is the majority of people on Earth stay within days walking distance from where they grew up. Further, there are numerous countries that if they wanted could easily cover the costs related to relocating anyone that desired to leave another country. I would argue the real explanation is most likely regardless of person’s situation, most want a predictable future…

> My understanding is the majority of people on Earth stay within days walking distance from where they grew up.

I can't see where you're disagreeing with me. What I'm saying is that people aren't choosing democracy, they just happen to live in one, and aren't willing or able to give up everything in order to move to a country that matches their political beliefs better.

> there are numerous countries that if they wanted could easily cover the costs related to relocating anyone

I don't understand what this means. If who wanted? Are you saying that there are lots of countries that are paying poor people to immigrate to them?

Re: Stop the proposal on mass surveillance of the EU

#430

Post by pessimizer »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #290
pessimizer wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In democracies, it really is pushed for {good reasons}. It's marketed to upper-middle class elites as reasonable, and of course it's upper-middle class elites that are paid to put together this marketing. But it's really orders from an owner class that has entirely different interests from the other 99.9% of the population. If an individual member of of the upper-middle class has a problem with {the imposition of t…

> The fantasyland is when we imply that they never speak to each other, never make plans, and have no agendas. It's a failure of thinking at scale. This fantasyland is denifately common falacy many here believe However it remains to be shown that their plans are what you say they are

> However it remains to be shown that their plans are what you say they are

I didn't mention any plans other than {the imposition of the week}, so I think introspection is due to discover why you think I did.

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